Incarcerated sex predator Harvey Weinstein is begging a judge to allow treatment from a private dentist to fix his rotten teeth to prevent a prison medic from extracting them all.
The prisoner and disgraced Hollywood mogul sat in a wheelchair in a Los Angeles courtroom on Wednesday as he pleaded with the judge.
“This situation is an emergency,” Weinstein lamented. “I will pay for the dentist… it will be one trip and one trip only.”
“I’m in pain every day,” the former movie producer continued. “And I can’t eat because I’m missing teeth.”
Weinstein recently visited a dentist at the Twin Towers Correctional, where he is locked up, twice, but his dental problems persist, noted LA Superior Court Judge Lisa Lench.
The dentist warned the 70-year-old rapist that his teeth must be pulled without replacement or continue to rot, Weinstein’s attorney Mark Werksman said.
Prohibiting Weinstein from access to adequate dental care is a violation of his constitutional rights and the holes in the front of his decaying teeth make him look “ridiculous and “like a caricature,” Werksman told the judge.
While Weinstein can afford to pay for transportation from the jail to a private dentist, the sheriff’s department would have to make an exception for Weinstein that other inmates aren’t afforded, Lench contends. Werksman must now write a formal request justifying Weinstein’s need for private treatment for the judge’s review.
Weinstein made the request for dental treatment as prosecutors during the hearing asked for two witnesses who live in Italy to testify remotely rather than in person.
The judge ruled one of the witnesses, Lubov Smirnova, who worked for one of Weinstein’s accusers, to appear in person, but allowed the other witness, Pascal Vicedomini, to appear by video for medical reasons.
In March, Weinstein was sentenced in a Manhattan criminal courtroom to 23 years for sexually assaulting a former assistant and raping an aspiring young actress.
He was acquitted on the most serious charge, predatory sexual assault, which carried a potential life sentence.
In August, New York’s highest court agreed to hear Weinstein’s appeal of his 2020 rape and sexual assault conviction.
Weinstein, who is currently locked up in California, may be released from prison on bail if the case goes to retrial.
